That’s actually a Fable. People COULD own Bibles. It’s just that since one Bible took years and years and years to make pre printing press, only the very wealthy could even dream of affording one.

Then, on top of that, you’d actually have to be LITERATE to read one. “Ah,” you say, “But they were all in Koine Greek or Latin, not the vernacular!!! So See, they were kept from the Masses!” Except, not really. because. at the time, if you were educated to read or write, you could read and write Latin, since that was the international language. (And, at the start of the time period you’re complaining about, it was also the vernacular for pretty much most of the world)

Those fancy stained glass windows in old churches? The whole POINT was to provide a ‘Children’s Picture Bible” in a world where books were precious treasures.

The “People were forbidden to OWN one” is actually a fable passed around by certain stripes of Protestant to explain why they’re justified in having their own sect, and why they were the first to get it right after 1500- 1800 years (depending on the sect) of TOTAL PERDITION.

But, thanks for repeating historically inaccurate catch phrases! Much like the inaccuracies in History Channel documentaries, they let me gauge how much to trust any future statements!

The Act For the Advancement of True Religion (England 1543) is but one example of the laws enacted to restrict the use of the bible by ‘lesser’ classes. It wasn’t simply that poor people couldn’t afford a bible, it was (indeed) against the law, and for the purposes of controlling what people thought about its contents.

Obviously this idea isn’t a ‘fable’ being passed around by Protestants, since the first example I found was enacted by a Protestant (one of the first) monarch. If you’re interested in fables, however, we’re talking about a book that’s full of pretty nifty ones. My favorite? The part where Yeshua smites the heck out of tree.

Like, seriously, this would have been the perfect time to start talking about how a lot of the real contest was between the german landed nobility (initially) and the catholic church’s temporal power. Certainly, many of the nobility who backed protestantism did not apparently believe in it – but they saw a chance to break, or at least, seriously damage, a monolith that very few of them liked in its political power. ARGH.

“Or the fact that a very small select group of people were initially responsible for rewriting all of the bible.”
Showing Pravda still effects us all.
“And the fact that the Bible had been warped out of its original intent by corrupt people for their own gain.”
Yes, but the “Gnu Atheists” aren’t getting away with that as much as they’d like to.

Bible 101 doesn’t cover the controversial first page which declares “The following work is fiction, any similarities to people past or present is purely coincidental. This work should not be taken seriously.”

No, just everyone else’s is wrong. Obviously the Nondenominational Church of Indiana (La Porte sect, of course, not like those corrupt Fort Wayne “Christians”) have the right copy, right translation, with the language perfectly adjusted to be understood in a modern context.

Though seriously, she said before that she went Nondenominational, so besides her irrational fear of Catholics and Mormons, who knows how she feels about other sects? (Willis, duh.)

Also, a sect of Christianity that believes that the Bible is imperfect, but on the whole true would be pretty interesting.

This is also Catholic teaching, we teach that the Bible is multifaceted and has many different meanings, and it was originally written more as a history of the people rather then a religious text. This is one of the major differences between Protestants and Catholics, tradition vs following the Bible, but to be fair, the split was caused because Catholics wouldn’t share the Bible.

The Anglican church is largely the same (despite being Protestant). due to it maintaining much of the Catholic tradition and the split was largely over secular power rather than theology. Honestly this is more a feature of American Evangelical churches more than anything else.

This was also how the Lutheran Church I more-or-less grew up in was. I know that there are varying sects within the Lutheran denomination, but in the one I went to it really felt like a Catholic Church sans the saints, the pope, and the crucifixes.

I live in an area now where pretty much you’re either Roman Catholic or evangelical, “fundamentalist” Southern Baptist. Among non-Catholic folks believing that the Bible is 100% true word-for-word is expected and assumed.
I’ve been told that while men did write the books of the Bible, they did so with God guiding their hands. It always sounds to me as if God possessed Moses, Mark, Luke and all the other authors, wrote what he/He wanted and deemed to be the truth, then vacated them when it was finished. If I say that aloud I get told I’m “missing the point” but no one can explain to me what the point actually is. Then if I mention that often words and phrases don’t translate well in to other languages and the enormous number of times the books of the Bible have been translated (I’m an interpreter. I know very well how translations can get jumbled), so that even assuming the original authors got it perfect, it could still be mistranslated, I’m told that obviously God guided the hands of the translators too so we should still take the Bible literally.
About that time I get the urge to find a wall to bang my head against.

“Also, a sect of Christianity that believes that the Bible is imperfect, but on the whole true would be pretty interesting.”

That would be the Mormons. Article of Faith 8: “We believe the Bible to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly; we also believe the Book of Mormon to be the word of God.”
i.e. “Yes, we are aware that this has been edited to high hilt, but it’s the best we’ve got. Luckily, we believe in modern revelation to double-check the meanings of stuff.”

Don’t forget about the Quakers! We are against creeds and formalized institutional statements of belief. There are even nontheist Friends. It’s more about a way of living or skiing out the truth for yourself than arguing about what that truth is.

Go visit a Mormon some time. They cling to the King James version like it’s gospel. Despite having a doctorinal disclaimer specifically to allow them to ignore any part they want. While simultaneously having a noticeably altered “corrected” translation of it around that they virtually never refer to. It’s complicated. Or something.

There are a lot of very loud Christians who CLAIM to believe the King James version is inerrant truth. They are not a majority, and the more familiar they are with the bible the less they tend to hold this position.

I was taught to believe that the version of the Bible we have is the inerrant word of God to us, and if there are other translations of the Bible then those are deceptions inflicted on other people. But we don’t have to worry. Because our Bible is perfect. Because God wouldn’t ever allow deceit to affect us because we’re southern baptists???

Nowadays it’s kinda hard to wrap my head around it, but it gets even weirder than that. My mother also believed that the US Constitution was written by jesus through the founding fathers and that we would never be able to run out of oil because jesus would give us more. Her entire life was and is coordinated and enabled through the careful, painstaking efforts of her parents and ex-husband, so challenges to this worldview are rare. She justifies every hardship or speedbump as the result of her sinful failings. Somehow that translates to an assertion, taught to her children, that our lives are baaasically just a game of Sims that god plays when he’s not beating his wife.

Really, it’s not so much a coherent model of the world as it is an instinct that builds excuses. Anything that might cause her to question whether or not her idea of right and wrong might need calibration -> TRUST IN GOD. Anything that might cause her to question the sunday school lessons she received at age six -> TRUST IN GOD. She burns her toast -> TRUST IN GOD. It got worse after her head injury.

Excuse me. I have to go listen to Let it Go on endless repeat for another six hours.

Ever read The Restaurant at the End of the Universe? That bit with the Total Perspective Vortex, which shows you a scale model of the entire universe, and your relevance to it all, and shatters the minds of any who witness it, because we’ve all developed delusions of significance to cope with out lives?

The real world would probably have that effect on Joyce. Then again, she’s been pretty resilient so far. If she saw the world as it truly is, she might just decide to put unicorn stickers on it.

I am not familiar with that at all, but it sounds silly. We are significant to ourselves, and that is what matters (if it even does… that’s taking for granted that being significant is somehow important). It is completely irrelevant whether or not we’re significant on a universal scale; why would anybody even care? Would we get a medal or a trophy if we were?

Doctor_Who: “If she saw the world as it truly is,”
Aaaaand , of course, you’ve got the corner on what “truly is,”
amIright?
Especially as the Dr. Who from the series actually does consider himself significant. “*I’ve* put a lot of work into it.”

I have a handle on what truly is! Joyce’s universe was created by Willis, and so it conforms to his decisions on the structure of the world. That means that, based on my knowledge of Willis’s worldview, I can say with certainty that in Joyce’s universe the only god is Willis. And I’m pretty sure she doesn’t worship Willis, and I’m very sure that Willis doesn’t match of with the description of the god in Joyce’s bible. Except for the part about having angels of death at his beck and call; that much it gets right.

It’s been implied that, in-comic, D&MM is the creation and work of the in-comic David Willis. So it could be considered that D&MM is the inerrant word of Joyce’s omnipotent creator, passed through the fourth wall to his in-comic avatar, and so in joining the D&MM fandom, Joyce is in fact converting to her comic universe’s one true religion.

I just hope in-comic Willis doesn’t have to get nailed to a post to seal the deal.

I’ve never gotten the appeal of cookies and cream. I mean, I like Oreos just fine. But it’s just vanilla ice cream with Oreos in it. There are way more interesting flavors than that. (I’m with you on cookie dough, though.)

I go to a fancy local-ingredient, season flavors all the time, 5 dollars for two scoops ice cream parlor, so I can’t even judge. Cookie dough is my favorite mainstream flavor, but I’d rather have something inventive and unusual any day of the week.

I have that issue with almost anything else: books, movies, etc. But ice cream is a comfort food, and I know what comforts me the most, so that’s what I pick. But I rarely order it when I go out, saving it for particular times. I like to get new kinds of ice cream every time. So many flavors, almost all good (if not all to my taste).

I once saw a national organization torn apart because of a debate over how wide a character’s belt should be cosplayed. One camp wanted it to be 2 1/2 inches, the other wanted it to be 3 inches. There was blood, screaming, war. It was fun.

Maybe not continents but vast majority of people yes, try insulting any popstar boy toy under the age of 21 on any mass media website like facebook,twitter, or YouTube I promise you their anyoing ass teen age girl fan base will be on your ass like hell fire.

That’s ‘cos no-one has tried translating Dexter & Monkey Monster from Archaic Americanese into Modern Scots yet. Just you wait 500 years ’til commoners are finally allowed to own a copy, then you’ll see 🙂

This was inevitable the moment he created DoA! Joyce as the character she is in a world not shaped around her worldview. Which is to say you’ve had years of warning; if you’re not braced for impact by now (or raring to go) there’s no help for you.

I hope she’s not talking about episode, “Rags to Misses” That episode felt chaotic on a whole and was far too dependent on running gags. I feel like the new seasons aren’t welcoming to the newer fan base and rely too much on older material.

I know I’m going to invite some flames here, but I really thought the Ape Wars arc was overrated. I know! Pathos and drama and plot and freaking Cerebus syndrome. It really overreached itself by trying to prove it wasn’t just a kids show.

Haha awesome. Now to divert people’s attentions, what fandom have you been acquainted or reacquainted with lately? I’ll start off: Twin Peaks. Man, what I wouldn’t give to live in a cozy quaint Pacific NW town with the occasional supernatural going-on.

I’ve seen one episode of Twin Peaks. I’d like to see more, but it’ll have to wait until I cross other things off my list. I’m having a lovely time with the Hannibal fandom. With the exception of when people get killed off, everyone is charming and lovely.

Let’s be real here: anybody that actually would be offended by sentiments like the comic shows here have probably already been driven away from Dumbing of Age, as it says stuff like this pretty much every single chance it can get. Willis just keeps beating that dang horse, without bothering to check its pulse or anything. Phrases like “preaching to the choir” come to mind.

I wouldn’t agree with that, the beating a dead horse part that is. This comic both shows Joyce continue to find her comfortable place in university and Walky learning to keep his mouth shut, even if it is at Dorothy’s prompting.

Ya I feel as if Willis probably drove away 20% of his reader with that Discussion on racism we had that one time and on how many people read this comic that’s probably a lot, which is part of the reason why he shut down the comment section that one time.

Beating a horse? Dude, Joyce’s struggle with her religion versus her life is kind of the central conceit of her character and probably the comic itself. It is WHY I am writing this thing, because that struggle is extremely personal and important to me. If the subject’s going to annoy you I’d go read some other damn comic that isn’t about a fundamentalist Christian going to a secular school for the first time.

I’m not saying that I’m against the cornerstone of the whole comic, it’s just repeating the same punchline over again (Joyce believes this silly thing, because of Religion) gets stale after reading it for years on end. We’ve figured out Garfield doesn’t like Mondays by now, thanks.

I’m not saying “stop talking about Joyce and religion”, because that’s a big part of the reason I’m here, I’m saying stop recycling the same joke, but with a different twist each time. You can make original jokes about transforming robots for years without it getting stale.

And no, I’m not going to stop reading your comic because I made a complaint (singular) and you got all mad. I’m going to sit here enjoying your comic for a long damn time, and now I can say I do it partly out of spite.

If “saying something about religion and being wrong” is just one joke, with no possible subfacets, then, wow, that is not a definition of “same joke” that I share, at all. It might be one of the most anti-comedy theories I’ve heard in a long time.

I dunno if those are great examples. I mean, the “joke” of Joyce’s religion and the reactions of those around her to it is constantly moving forward and evolving based on new sets of stimuli, whereas the jokes you mention are largely pretty samey and stagnant.

Oh no, I very much enjoy the strip. It’s a highlight of my day. And being told to stop reading it entirely because I said something negative peeves me off. Somebody telling me that just makes me want to keep on enjoying it regardless of what they think. The fact that it’s the author is irrelevant.

And thank you for that. If it wasn’t for your comic, I probably wouldn’t interact with my family at all, but since… like, halfway through It’s Walky!, Joyce storylines have helped me put my relationship with my crazier southern baptist relatives into perspective.

That’s something I’ve personally seen quite commonly among atheists and agnostics raised in fairly stringent Christian households. That said, IIRC Walkyverse Walky wasn’t from such a background, so it’s still kinda odd unless it was the kinda thing he’d learned not to do because of the community his family lived in and the kids he associated with.

“X” is an abbreviation for Christ. Modern days it’s mostly used for Xmas, but from the 11thish century to the early 1900s it was used more commonly (For things like Xtopher (Christopher), Xene (Christine), and Xtianity (Christianity)). I still use it because it saves time and space, both of which didn’t really work here because I’m typing this long reply, but hey, I love babbling about History.

I know of some atheists who refuse to do such because they think it’s silly to swear by fictitious beings they don’t believe in. In much the same way one doesn’t use the words “unicorn” or “pixies” in vain.

Quebec has the worst swears ever. One of the guys in my gaming group’s from Montreal, and… it’s really difficult to take someone seriously when they’re mad when their idea of hard-hitting profanity is “chalice”, “tabernacle” and “host”. It’s almost as bad as Joyce’s wrongswears.

“Tabernack!” at least has a okay ring to it, but it’s still no competition for English’s harsh Anglo-Saxon monosyllables, or even France-French obscenities.

It’s a bit longer than the most, so there’s plenty of time to make it really land. You can do it all at once when you’re just irritated (“gahdamit”), the bit where you slowly build up volume as you do it when you just can’t take it any more (“god-DAMN-IIIIIT”!), you can break it up into two words for that special one-two punch (“God! Dammit!”), or you can really just let it linger to express that real combination of anger and resignation (“God… dammit”).

YEAP. Once you allow your mind to really think on how things became “canon” in the Bible and then compare that to Star Wars EU canon… well anyone who remains a firm believer is a stronger person than I. Or delusional, but I’ll leave that up in the air.

Wait… she researched a fandom and didn’t come out morally enraged or scarred? Every fandom of everything ever always has at least ONE “super special type of perverse” fan that writes and/or draws really twisted shit. Pretty sure google images would have bombarded her with alien x ape porn after the first line or two of fanart… And there’d probably be at least one creepypasta.

Unrelated note, but it makes me sad that the only thing representative of the MLP fandom is Bronies, and that the only thing that seems to be representative of Bronies are the perverse and beligerent elements of the fandom. 🙁 I mean, other fandoms contain those elements too; why aren’t they as vilified? Is it because that these people are defiling what is perceived by society to be the essense of girliness and femininity? Is it that they’re being beligerent about it and making themselves out as jerks?

There’s a lot I can say on the subject, but since this isn’t an appropriate place to discuss it, I’ll end off by saying that I suppose it’s just an example of the adage “One rotten apple spoils the whole bunch”.

Yeah…but it also reflects humans as well. I always believe that these kinds of people are the reason why we can never have nice things..there’s always that one asshole who ruins it for everybody. Remember the times where we have something that is pretty damn good, and then either some asshole or assholes who for some damn reason muck it up for everyone else and we can’t even escape them for they are everywhere and in every aspect of our lives.

My take on the MLP ‘brony’ fandom and why it’s so villified is because it did a series of progressive steps towards something really, when you think about it, is just all sorts of fucked up.

1. MLP is made with little girls of a certain age bracket in mind… as the toys were. Not that Lauren Faust ever had a problem with boys liking it, but her target audience is girls. Little girls. Girls ages 5-12 if I remember right…. But yes. It’s a girls series for girls for the intent of teaching girls lessons about friendship and overcoming trials in a way that appeals to girls. Girls.

2. Guys start liking the series and cut their little niche into the fandom by calling themselves a cutesy title ‘brony’. Harmless fun. Just a bunch of guys who like to watch a cartoon that’s made for girls because… they like it. MLP creator has no desire or inclination to cater to them because they fall outside of her target demographic, and it starts off with bronies being cool with that, because they know they’re watching a TV show made for girls.

3. Bronies get comfortable in their niche and some members start doing what happens in every fandom… thinking about, discussing, and fantasizing about it in ways that were not intended by the creator. Some of ends up being completely opposite of what the series intended, like the animated youtube parody videos where Pinkie Pie violently kills all the other ponies because she’s the happiest character and happy characters are always psychotic joke… and some ends up being sexual, either because “lolololol rule 34” joke or because the people doing that genuinely get off on “pony porn”… Ignorable at this stage… annoying, sometimes disturbing, but ignorable. MLP is still made for girls.

4. Some bronies start thinking that since they watch the series so religiously, buy merchandise, or do something as inane as post a billion times on official forums, that the series needs to start catering to THEM and the adult bronies want adult themes, such as violence and sex. They start getting loud about it and shoving their weight around by producing more “fan content” that is violent and/or pornographic… While Lauren Faust and the other producers of the show still show NO inclination towards catering to these people, their behavior starts affecting the show itself by managing to make the number of ACTUAL LITTLE GIRLS who are fans of the show shy away from the series both in terms of watching the show or participating in online venues for it. Girls are actually getting scared off or grossed out by the things they find on the internet related to MLP to where it actually turns them off from the show entirely, so the shows ratings for their target demographic are declining. While a bunch of adult men may keep the ratings up and buying merchandise, the target demographic is being pushed out and scared off.

So… yeah. Imagine if you had a little sister or female relative and she was given a treehouse for her and her friends to enjoy. Her and her friends have fun in it for awhile, but then grown adult men find the treehouse and decide that they like it too. These adult men start hanging out in the treehouse and decide to make themselves at home. They hook up TVs with consoles and start hanging up posters… then start playing extremely violent videogames, spouting off foul language, watching porn and masturbating, drinking, getting in fights, and their posters all end up being violent or pornographic in some way. Your little sister/female relative and her friends end up being intimidated and scared away from their treehouse, even though it’s still THEIRS and was meant for them, but they understandably don’t want to be around a bunch of grown men being violent, vulgar, and showing them content that is completely inappropriate to her and her friends.

So… yeah. That’s just my conclusion on bronies. I know a few guys who are bronies and are disgusted with what the fandom has become and the stigma it has now, but as with everything… the cool and moderate people are always drowned out by the loud and obnoxious few.

Because almost the ENTIRE MLP fandom is a misaimed fandom, I would wager. I mean, sure, there’s always “that guy” in every other fandom, but with the bronies it’s like 95% of them.

It’s actually a point that Willis brings up in relation to his own hobby all the time in Shortpacked… yes, there are adults that collect toys, but the majority of the consumers and the target audience are actual children, and that’s sort of as it should be. Failing to understand that as a member of the misaimed (i.e. adult) portion of the hobby kinda makes you a jerk.

I will leave what this implies about Christians arguing over bible interpretation, especially old-testament interpretation, as an extremely easy exercise for the reader.

The MLP fandom isn’t really anything special. It’s just the latest annoyingly loud and inescapable fandom. A new one crops up every few years, I believe the last one was Harry Potter, it was everywhere all the time. Twilight was similarily everywhere but it was more of a hatedom that was the loud ones.

When one of these fandoms goes huge your feelings on the subject plays a big deal. If you like it then you don’t quite notice how pervasive it is and maybe wish the better less obsessive fans were recognised as the majorities. If you don’t like the fandom you notice how it’s absolutely everywhere and each mention just makes you madder.

As a Brony, what bothers me is that the negative side of the fandom gets all the attention, despite the positive things the fandom has done. As far as I know, there isn’t a single member of the fandom that the irony of the situation that they are a fan of a show designed for small girls. Hell that whole thing was one of the reasons I avoided giving it a chance for so long. Then I saw some of the creative works of the fandom, a few music videos t original songs inspired by the show. I hadn’t seen that in any other fandom. SO I gave it a shot. [the show having Lauren Faust of powerpuff girls and foster home for imaginary friends fame helped too.]

Unfortunately in the Brony Fandom, we have a mix between, true fans who actually LIKE the show, troll fans who just want to inflate the worst possible parts of the fandom mentality weather they honestly like it or not, hipster fans who I just feel are only riding this boat because its the in thing of the moment., and perverse fans, who may or may not be true fans, but are responsible for the need of a mature content filter that works on google search.

Mind you every fandom is plagued by some of the same things. Sonic the Hedgehog, Danny Phantom, Kim Possible, Inuyasha, the more popular something is the more positive, AND negative things can be found in its fandom.

I think people need to chill out of about the fandom hate, except twilight, that was a bastardization of everything that is werewolf/vampire. vampires dont sparkle in sunlight, they friggin BURN, this was established YEARS ago.

Pink being a girls color is reletively recent, it was originally the color of little boys.

But, unlike virtually everything else, MLP–and MLP:FIM in specific–is both DIRECTLY TARGETED at young girls [with a concession for adult viewers who may or may not happen to be cis-male] AND fairly well-known. It’s practically impossible to find someone* who isn’t at least aware of MLP and, thanks to the cookie-cutterness of the characters, able to recognize it on sight, while even Disney characters might leave you wondering whether they’re Disney [or merely Disney-owned, in many cases].

*I guess if you leave first-world society, then MAYBE.

MLP is also the most, ah, “corruptible” of the franchises you mentioned, if we get into that ick factor… I thought about adding more to this thought, but =|

I never said it was appropriate. I was making a commentary on Joyce and what her reaction would be if she found Dexter x Monkey Master porn, because despite being cheery and generally in control of herself to where she can have an Atheist friend who has sex and doesn’t have aspirations of being a housewife with children, she’s STILL rather judgey and personally intolerant of things that don’t align with her faith. Yes, again, she is friends with Dorothy, but she likely still thinks Dorothy is going to hell for not believing in God and being pure. She just values her friendship here and NOW enough to just not get into deep religious discussion where that things like that pop up, and to face down her parents when they were demanding she never speak to Dorothy again. She’s learning, and getting better in tiny amounts, but old habits die hard… and religious habits are like cockroaches in terms of that.

Bronies are annoying because they felt the need to create a label/subculture centered around their being male fans of a show targeted towards girls. The only reason they’d do this is to distance themselves from the “girliness” of the show, sorta like how insecure guys who show affection for other men feel the need to use “no homo” as a disclaimer. It’s inherently sexist/androcentrist.

I’ve never really understood people’s problems with cloppers, or their various equivalents in other fandoms. So people like to write/draw pornified versions of fictional characters. So what? Don’t look.

It’s the angrily, belligerently obsessive people in the fandoms that generally keep me a fan on the outside. … Like the (apparent) majority of Bronies.

The main problem people have with cloppers is that the subject in general is ponies, and generally speaking, masturbating to animals is seen as really gross because they aren’t human. But aren’t they? The ponies in MLP are, by all other accounts, pretty human, with human speech and human-like societies, human emotions and human thoughts and feelings. It’s just that they have the outward appearance of a pony. But if they represent certain personalities that appeal to you, what does it matter about the way they look?

Basically, it’s all specism. Never mind that they, for all intents and purposes, are self-aware, intellectual creatures capable of complex thoughts and emotions; they look like animals so having sexual fantasies about them makes you disgusting.

And of course, this argument is putting aside the fact that it’s a show meant for little girls, because that’s already a given. But it isn’t really; not after very adult references like The Big Lebowski characters appearing in a shot (with The Jesus, no less), or a scene remake from the movie Trainspotting.

Bah, this got me rambling, and you can clearly see where I stand on the issue, so I’m just gonna stop right here. XD

I strongly suspect that a lot of the issue with bestiality throughout the centuries is similar to the issue with sex toys; if you’re sexing something that ain’t human, you’re clearly doing it for nonprocreative reasons, you sicko you.

My biggest issue is that the ponies act like and are generally considered to be about 10-13 year old girl ponies. This is emphasized in the “Equestria girls” subshow that they’ve come out with, where the ponies see their more human like selves. These selves are little girls. So the creation of pornography around characters that act like and are meant to be prepubescent girls freaks me out a little.

They ARE fictional, and that makes a difference, but many people consider Lolita to be a disturbing book and she is a fictional character too. It makes us uncomfortable to think of grown men preferring the characteristics of children in sexual arenas.

I made reference in another post to the MLP fandom being like a treehouse made specifically for a little girl and her friends… only for some random adult guys to decide they like it and essentially take it over with the “adult themes” of violence and sex by playing violent games, watching porn, etc… How fair is it to the little girls of MLP to have grown men pushing their way into something made for them and trying to make it cater to THEIR wants and whims, to the point where the girls no longer feel welcome, or even safe, to try and enjoy it like they were supposed to? Do a google search sometime on MLP and take a look at all the ‘adult’ content that fills up the first page. Safe search might help weed that stuff out, but even that’s not foolproof. Imagine being a parent and seeing your daughter wading through hundreds of images of “pony porn” while she was just innocently looking for some fanart for a desktop background… or imagine being the girl that just wants to find pretty and cool MLP pics and ends up with page upon page of Rainbow Dash eating out Fluttershy. Unfortunately that’s what’s happening with it, and the target demographic (little girls) is starting to decline despite the show, for what it was made for, being good.

When I went to my significant other’s church a couple weeks ago (I’m a lasped Catholic, but I went to Catholic school and am well-read in the Bible just from my childhood), the Priest homily included whole sections talking about how each of the gospels are a different man’s interpretation of the life of Jesus and how interpreting them in different ways is absolutely essential – that it shouldn’t be taken literally. He also mentioned that Mary and Martha are two of Jesus’ greatest students according to John but that the Church and Christian religions in general downplay their importance (Mary Magdalene’s in particular) because they’re women and sexism is a thing that still exists in religion. It was the most progressive, feminist homily I ever heard and I was actually grinning at the end because my god, that priest got it. Just the “we have to take the gospels with a grain of salt because they were written from the point of few of fallible men” was awesome.

I’m Christian, and even I know the awkwardness of her statement. For me, it’s non-fiction, but I know that it’s written and translated by people who are flawed, have their own views, and write what they believe is the most accurate that doesn’t conflict with their views.

If you ever need an example, try looking up the dead sea scrolls, and the books that didn’t make the cut for the bible because of their controversial content.

Yeah, there was a fascinating article I read back when the CofE was voting on female bishops, about how the arguments against from the KJV were based on … well, Hanlon’s Razor says I should call them mistranslations, but it’s interesting how there didn’t seem to be any mistranslations that could be read as giving women more power.

On the other hand, I was once involved in an internet argument with someone who insisted that every single alteration of the Bible was divinely inspired … up to the version he had. Then I think it stopped.

I have access to three different versions of the bible. King James, Good News, and The Good Leader. Two of them have translated a book of the bible so it reads as erotic poetry with graphic sex acts. The third has translated the same book as gentle romantic poetry suitable for small children. Guess which one I think Joyce reads.

The think is, Walky wasn’t actually going to point out the immensely high likelihood of the Bible also being ‘fiction written by flawed mortal men’, rather, he was about to chastise Joyce for speaking such filthy blasphemy against the Gospel that is Dexter and Monkey Master.

Joyce’s brother is transgendered, which is going to be fun but I’d like to make it even weirder. I’d love to see Leslie Bean get with Joyce’s mother because she’s a closeted lesbian. It would be a great reversal of Leslie’s own history in the Walkyverse and also we could see truly EPIC fallout.

You are absolutely correct and I apologize for making a stupid statement which is as stupid as stupid can be without creating a vortex of stupid which can rip me apart in my own stupidity as it is my hope will happen to the stupidest of stupids.

So, what exactly do Christians think happened when the Bible was written? Its well established that its basically a Frankenstenian patchwork of different texts, did God posses the guys who wrote it or what?

Christians, it should be noted, are not a monolithic group and Joyce’s particular brand of Christianity does not represent more than 1% of the world’s believers at best. The vast majority of us don’t believe in Creationalism. Jesus taught in parable, so does the Bible.

Making up numbers to try to defray the crazy is a little bit silly. Let’s look at some real ones, shall we?

A 2011 Gallup poll found that roughly 3 in 10 Americans believed in the literal truth of the bible. A 2012 Gallup poll found that roughly 46% of respondents believed that humans were created directly, in their present state, by God, within the last 10,000 years.

IIRC, Gallup’s methodology is a little outdated. They use robo-dialers that aren’t allowed to call cell phones (because it’s against federal law) and thus they can only reach those people with a landline to call. Skews the results. That’s part of the reason they consistently showed Romney in the lead during the 2012 US Presidential election.

Not to praise Gallup, but the number of sects or the majority of the religion has no bearing whatsoever on the outcome of a poll that is about beliefs and not (directly) about sects and religions.

You would have been better off pointing out the poll specifically talks about Americans, which is of little use when talking about the percentage of people in the world who are Christian. Especially considering that Americans are notoriously backwards religiously, especially for a country without a state religion.

* When I worked for Citi, I dealt with Gallup numbers every day, learned how they’re gathered, and learned they’re bullcrap. Never trust ‘em.* I saw someone lose their bonus because Gallup ranked them the worst after surveying one customer who was talking about a different person.* The feedback was “The service was terrible. I’m glad that second agent fixed it, she was amazing.” Gallup marked it against the 2nd agent.* Every time I see Gallup poll numbers affecting the outcome of major world events I cry a little.

If we were to go by a very quick and dirty estimation of 40% of the USA as creationist, which is the statistic I hear thrown around the most, and assume a rough amount of 2.2 billion christians in the world, American creationists alone would account for about 5.5% percent of the world’s believers. Mind you, I realise creationists aren’t a monolithic group either.

Hell, even the Catholic Church (no bastion of progressiveness–at least lately) doesn’t take the Bible literally and believes in evolution. A lot of fundamentalist ideas are peculiarly American phenomenon. Then again, our nation WAS settled by the people England thought were too weird to allow to remain in Europe. I say this as a Presbyterian, a church which was started by one of the meanest nastiest Christian fanatics around–and which is now very liberal.

Depending on what sect of Christianity you’re talking about, some of them actually do acknowledge that much of the Bible is clearly, shall we say, colorful myths and exaggerations due to being stories passed through oral tradition by men, and finally written down by men, and men back then had a tendency to believe in some pretty wild stuff. Back in Catholic school I recall them using the phrase “inspired by God” rather than “literal word of God” to describe the Bible, the point being that the moral lessons were important, and believing in the exact events themselves not so much.

This refers especially to the Old Testament. Stuff in the New Testament tends to be more subtle, plus it was written down much sooner after the events of Jesus’s life compared to the Old Testament scripture.

Pretty much every theologian I’ve ever met have said the same thing. The Bible, whether inspired by God or not, was written by mortal men detailing events that took place decades at best, centuries at most before they were put to paper. Centuries of oral repetition where every retelling would add a little to the story.

Just wanted to say that the last panel of this strip is probably the best of any I’ve seen you do DW. The way you convey the three characters all interacting (or just acting in Joyce’s case I suppose) really comes alive. Well done sir, well done indeed!